Safe
by Misato
Summary: Nick needs to find a way to distract Ellis while they wait for Coach and Rochelle to get back to the safe house. He just might have come up with something.


Nick thought that if he had to watch Ellis pace up and down the safe room one more time he was going to lose his mind. "Ellis. Ellis, _sit down_."

Ellis shook his head so hard his hat almost came flying off. "We shouldn't've split up. No way. Now Coach an' Rochelle are out there somewhere, an' we don't even know if they're in trouble or what's going on. We been here hours already, they should've been back by now."

"First of all," Nick said, gritting his teeth around the words, "we've only been here forty-five minutes." Truthfully, he was worried too; he and Ellis hadn't exactly taken the most direct route. First came the Jockey jumping on Nick's shoulders and drawing far off course, then there was that Hunter coming out of nowhere and pinning Ellis down; Nick had been surrounded by five zombies of his own and could only watch as the Hunter started slashing. If it had taken Nick just a few more seconds to put them down....Nick pushed the thought deep and down. Not the time. Not that it would ever be the time.

At any rate, it wasn't a good sign at all that they'd made it to the safe house first, but he'd try to arm wrestle a Tank before letting Ellis know that. The kid was already almost at the point of picking up the nearest shotgun and storming back outside. Nick didn't want to do anything to push him over.

Besides, Nick had always prided himself on his poker face. "They're fine. We all decided on splitting up, and besides, it's not like we had much of a choice. Or did you _want_ to go and spook that Witch?"

Ellis leaned against the grimy wall, his arms crossed. "No," he finally admitted. "But you gotta admit, somethin' wrong. No way it should've taken them all this time to get back, no way. Somethin' happened out there, somethin' bad."

"Ellis, shut up."

"Y'know, this is just like the time me an' Keith found that cave, an' I told him, 'No way am I goin' in there,' but you know he didn't listen, an' he goes, 'Well, then I'll just go in an' look around," then...."

"_Ellis!_" Nick grabbed him by his shirt collar and pressed him against the wall. And Nick didn't really know why --- maybe it was the near-miss with the Hunter, maybe it was just the only way Nick could think of to make Ellis _stop talking_ for five seconds --- Nick leaned forward and kissed him.

He felt Ellis hitch in a surprised breath and had an agonizing moment when he wasn't sure what Ellis was going to do. Then Nick heard the gun Ellis had picked up clatter to floor as Ellis grabbed him by the arms and pulled him closer. Nick reached under Ellis' T-shirt, first tracing the length of bandages covering the Hunter's handiwork, then trailing down his ribs. Ellis shivered when Nick hit a sensitive spot; he started grinding and Nick gasped, one hand sliding past Ellis' waistband and the other bracing himself against the wall. Finally Nick pulled back, resting his forehead against Ellis' temple as he tried to get his ragged breathing back under control. "For once, just shut up."

"Okay." Ellis' arm was around his waist, and he didn't show any indication of moving it. And he actually managed to stay quiet for ten whole seconds. "Say, how'd you know I'd be okay with that? Lotsa guys wouldn've broken your nose or somethin' for trying that."

Nick shrugged. "I gambled. I do that."

Ellis chuckled deep in throat. "Yeah. Forgot that. Guess you're pretty good, huh?"

Nick smiled to himself. He'd never been more than mediocre, really; big time high rollers didn't wind up hustling back alley card games in Georgia. Not that it really mattered anymore. "They'll come back. We'll all be all right"

"What if they don't?"

"Then we'll still be all right."

Ellis nodded. "Okay."

Nick ran his thumb along Ellis' jaw. It was strange, but he was actually finding Ellis being so quiet kind of unnerving. "What, this doesn't remind you of some stupid story?"

"Hey, do I have to have a story about everything?" Nick waited three beats, then Ellis started up again: "Well, actually, there was that one time...."

Nick shook his head and kissed him again, cutting Ellis off mid-sentence. He didn't seem to mind.


End file.
